


Mutually Beneficial

by Diary



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Bechdel Test Fail, Canon Character of Color, Conversations, Gen, POV Blaise Zabini, POV Character of Color, POV Male Character, Post-Order of the Phoenix, Pre-Half-Blood Prince, Slytherins Being Slytherins
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-23
Updated: 2016-02-23
Packaged: 2018-05-22 18:54:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,946
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6090751
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Diary/pseuds/Diary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Repost. "Interesting," he says. "Let me buy you lunch, Bulstrode." Complete.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mutually Beneficial

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own Harry Potter.

A figure appears in the fireplace.

Slipping his hand into his pocket, Blaise Zabini grips his wand.

The figure seems to be a woman. She walks straight to the counter with her head down and a hooded cloak shielding her face.

Relaxing slightly, Blaise withdraws his hand, continues to play with the stack of bloody cards, and winces when the deck wins a round and causes another cut on his skin.

His mum and her newest husband have been scaring the house-elves so badly he knows it's only a matter of time before he finds himself deposited in Diagon Alley with a pocket full of gold. When he returns, he’ll be locked out of the manor while Mum and the house-elves try to distract him and the ministry officials ask polite, pointed questions until she casts a temporarily blinding charm when the body's ready to be moved.

This year, he's taking the initiative. 

He has a fictional friend, a Ravenclaw boy, whose house he's staying at. This fictional friend is obsessed with ice-cream, and thus, they'll be spending a lot of time at Florean's.

In reality, he's staying at the Leaky Cauldron.

Blaise imagines one of the house-elves will find him whenever this latest stepfather, an old man who recently updated his will, ends up dead. He thinks this one had an ancestor who had something to do revealers. Maybe the ancestor invented them, or maybe the ancestor was just a lucky investor.

Frankly, Blaise doesn't give a toss.

"Sorry, honey," the assistant clerk says with her accented voice carrying. She’s a young, perky witch who seems to be unaware she's employed in a shop full of dark objects. "We aren't allowed to sell that anymore."

Blaise wonders if the hooded figure is a classmate of his. More curiously, however, is the thought of what exactly the shop isn’t allowed to sell.

It’s full of things capable of killing people; to go further, things in this shop _have_ killed people. 

Turning slightly, he watches the two.

The hooded figure holds something up.

"Oh, that's very interesting! I'll have to get Mr Borgin, though. I'm not allowed to buy things on his behalf."

 _Anymore_ , is the missing word, he imagines, and he ponders what harmless, worthless thing she was duped into buying and how much money it cost the shop.

The assistant witch tries to coax an obviously terrified owl into staying still long enough for her to tie a letter to it, and the hooded figure stands still with an air of irritation clinging to her.

Grabbing the cards and ignoring the gash they cause across his nose, Blaise makes his way up to the counter. "Excuse me. How much for these?"

The hooded figure jumps, but instead of automatically looking up and over at him, she turns the other direction and brings her hand up to tug her hood further down.

"Bulstrode," he realises. "Millicent Bulstrode?"

She didn't put the object up before bringing her hand up, and he sees a recognisable collar made of dragon leather with a ruby red jewel hanging from it.

Since their second year, Millicent Bulstrode has had a black cat with a Japanese-sounding name.

Now, she turns, straightens, and lowers her hood. "Zabini."

"Did something happen to your cat?"

The perky witch glares.

"No. We have plenty of spiders." Before he can respond, Bulstrode shakes her head. "Never mind. Yumiko's fine. It isn't your business."

Blaise remembers, once, a Gryffindor boy had tried to do something to Bulstrode's cat. No one knew exactly what, but he had to wait a week for the bright blue words on his face to disappear. _Cat hurter._

Even Snape had seemed impressed when demanding Bulstrode hand her cat's collar over so he could figure out exactly what magic was contained within.

"The deck costs twenty galleons, sir," the assistant witch tells him.

Setting the deck down, he pushes it aside. He has the money, but twenty galleons is a waste for something he'll likely never use. "Does your grandmother and mum know you're here?" 

"Again, that's none of your business."

He looks at her closely and notices, not only has she's lost some weight, but her face is somewhat gaunt.

Oh, he thinks. Suddenly, he remembers many places are cracking down on the presence of hags. He hadn't stopped to think how this would affect the Bulstrode family, but he knows he should have. Her grandmother's a hag, her mother looks like a hag despite having a human father, and most people can tell by looking Bulstrode she has hag blood in her. Apparently, none of them can or will shapeshift, and he knows Bulstrode is the most magically talented member of her family.

"Not many cat lovers shop here," he points out. "Unless that's enchanted to kill unwanted cats, it won't bring much at all."

"Damn," Bulstrode mutters. Stuffing the collar in her robes, she admits, "Good point.”

Pulling her hood up, she goes out the front door.

The assistant witch sighs, "Thank you." Petting the owl, she announces, "Brooks is a silly goose; he doesn't like Mr Borgin very much!"

Making sure to keep his tone polite, he inquires, "You wouldn't happen to know Umbridge, would you?"

"Is that a German spell? I don't do well with other languages. Would you like me to look it up for you, sir?"

"No," he answers.

He leaves the shop and promptly finds Bulstrode a few feet away with a goblin she's holding at wand point. "I don't give a damn what goblin made it," she declares. "My grandmother found it abandoned on a street, and the hag way is that anything found abandoned belongs to the Being who found it!"

"Thief!"

Bulstrode’s wand begins to emit a gray light.

"Expelliarmus," Blaise says.

Walking over, he notices the goblin's clothing. "Looks like you're a ministry official, goblin. Do you know how bad this would look, an official trying to nick something off a teenage witch?"

"Brats," the goblin mutters. "Think you're superior, just because-"

"Do you listen," Bulstrode cuts in. "My grandmother is a hag. My mother- she looks like a hag. I don't go around stealing things from people's pockets, and that does make me superior to _you_. Zabini here, he's his own person. Don't lump his beliefs and mine together just because we both carry wands."

She turns, suddenly, her wand is back in her hands, and she walks past them.

Blaise runs to catch up with her. "Bulstrode!"

Suddenly, her wand is pointed at him. "Zabini, is there a reason you keep interfering in my business?"

"You aren't acting like yourself," he answers. "Visiting dark shops, drawing your wand on a wandless creature. I thought we only had to worry about Malfoy, Parkinson, and Nott making things worse for our House."

This deflates her, and she withdraws her wand. "You were in the dark shop, too."

"Act of rebellion," he replies. "If my mum knew I was there, she'd lock him in my room until Hogwarts started. How'd you get your wand back?"

"Some witches with hag blood have the ability to automatically summon their wand without another wand."

"Interesting," he says. "Let me buy you lunch, Bulstrode."

Her only response is a blank look.

"I'm not taking the mickey out on you," he promises. "You can tell me what's going on, and I can hopefully make my mum believe I've been having fun. She gets worried when I come back with too much money."

Shrugging, she says, "Might as well."

…

They go to the Leaky Cauldron, and he orders Chickpea curry and butterbeer.

"Oysters, fruit salad with olive juice, and Earl Gray tea," Bulstrode says.

"We have goose liver," the waiter politely suggests.

She nods. "I'll have that instead of the oysters."

Once the waiter's gone, Blaise asks, "Is this about places cracking down on hags?"

A slight frown crosses her face. "Yes. Yumiko's fine; as I said, we have plenty of spiders. But even the places that accept hags, they're charging through the roof. My grandmother's taken to trying to find-"

Bulstrode doesn't finish, but he knows. Her grandmother's taken to trying to find dead animals on the street. There’s a plethora of risks inherent in this. For one thing, no matter how well the meat's cleaned, there's no guarantee it's completely safe to eat. For another, from what he's gathered, Bulstrode's village doesn't take kindly to the family's presence, and if the villagers found out, they might do something even worse than what they've done in the past.

Still, hags are carnivorous. He imagines this applies to Bulstrode, as well.

"Is there anything I can do to help?"

"Know anyone willing to buy a cat collar, old baby toys, and some muggle books?"  

"I can ask around," he answers. "Send you an owl."

Their food comes, and he sees beets have been added to the fruit salad. Everyone in Slytherin knows how much Bulstrode loves them, but for the moment, he trusts all of their housemates to leave her be. Here, however, the fact she didn’t specifically request them and the fruit salad doesn’t typically include them-

"I'd appreciate that. What's troubling you, Zabini?"

"I imagine my stepfather will dead, soon," he answers. "Mum's beautiful, but I-"

He'd really prefer not to believe there are so many men taken in by this fact alone. Yet, he'd also like to not believe his mother _rapes_ men and forces marriage on them.

Most of all, he'd like to stop having so many stepfathers. His mum is up there with the Malfoys in terms of wealth. They have several elves, a nice manor, plenty of food, and comfortable clothes. What more does she want?

Bulstrode nods. "Have you tried talking to her?"

"More than once."

Those conversations always consisted of her promising she'd never hurt him, telling him not to listen to the things people say, and then, trying to pacify him with sweets or other sorts of presents.

A small pop interrupts them, and Blaise sees his snow-white, pink-eyed elf. Sighing, he asks, "Klinky, is he dead?"

Klinky blinks. Looking at Bulstrode with great interest, he bows. "Hello, Miss. Klinky is sorry to interrupt."

"Klinky," he repeats, "is he dead? Do I need to come home and help with the ministry?"

"No, Master," Klinky answers. He continues to steal glances at Bulstrode. "Mistress wishes to meet Master's Ravenclaw friend. We- thought Master might want to come home. We know Master has been spending much time at- Master really does have a friend?" 

Klinky grabs Bulstrode’s knife, and Blaise quickly mutters, "Accio knife.”

When he was little, he used to think it was funny when the elves hurt themselves, but now, it's annoying and strikes him as pathetic. "You can punish yourself with the newspaper at home."

Klinky will smack himself with a rolled up newspaper, and then, Blaise will take it away.

He's tried ordering them not to punish themselves, but his mother's orders override his, and she doesn't have any problems with it.

"Yes, Master."

"Alright," Blaise says. He counts out the payment for the meal and the tip. Then, he holds the pouch out for Bulstrode. "Here. It's mutually beneficial. My mum will think I've had fun, and you can help your family out, some."

"Zabini-"

"Now, more than ever, people like you and I need to stick together," he tells her. "This isn't charity."

Despite her uneasy expression, she reaches over and takes it.

He offers his hand. "I have to go. Thanks for the talk, Bulstrode."

Shaking it, she says, "Take care of yourself, Zabini.”

Nodding, Blaise gets up and takes Klinky's hand. "Let's go home."


End file.
